


There Will Be an Essay Portion

by dancinbutterfly



Series: Tried and Tested Series [3]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Age Difference, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Angst, Arguing, Awkward Conversations, Banter, Confessions, Cubs, Cuddling, Derek has the hardest life, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Family, Family Drama, Insecurity, M/M, Mating Cycles/In Heat, Meet the parents conversations, Misunderstandings, Mpreg, Near-Canon AU, Parents, Revelations, Romance, Sheriff Stilinski is a superhero, Slash, Snuggling, Spoilers for S2E12 Master Plan, Stiles is a creampuff with a spine of steel, Teen Pregnancy, Unplanned Pregnancy, Werewolf Biology, Werewolves, baby drama
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-12
Updated: 2012-09-12
Packaged: 2017-11-14 02:00:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/510124
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dancinbutterfly/pseuds/dancinbutterfly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dude plus dude does not equal baby. Stiles knows this. He did the math. Only it turns out that werewolf math works differently sometimes. Yeah, Stiles is in so deep. His dad is going to make sure of that.</p>
            </blockquote>





	There Will Be an Essay Portion

**Author's Note:**

> Wow, so, I have to say I'm shocked by how much yall like this and deeply grateful. Thank you! The support you left in kudos and comments mean so much to me. I hope this lives up to your hopes because this, as always, is for you.
> 
> Huge thanks to [ariadne83](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Ariadne83), [Thirstingdragon](thirstingdragon)[dodificus](http://archiveofourown.org/users/dodificus), [1001cranes](http://archiveofourown.org/users/1001cranes) and [knight_tracer](http://archiveofourown.org/users/knight_tracer)for handholding, brainstorming and beta. I couldn't have done any of this without each of you.

"I'm sorry, you're what?"

"You heard me."

"But it doesn't make any sense. How can you be pregnant?"

Derek's sitting with a knee folded underneath him, chest on the couch, shoulder resting against one overstuffed armrest. Stiles is frantic. His bare feet make a soft padding sound as he paces back and forth across the living room. Derek finds himself almost hypnotized by the rhythmic movement and noise.

Suddenly Stiles is almost on top of him, bending over into his face and snapping his fingers. "Come on, Earth to Derek. You do not get to drop a bomb, a ridiculous and impossible bomb by the way, and then check out."

"I'm not checked out. I'm just tired, " Derek says. It's not a total lie. He's exhausted. It's like now that he's with Stiles his body has decided that it's going into hibernation mode. All he wants to do is go back up to Stiles' room, crawl into Stiles' bed, and sleep. He'd like it better if he could get Stiles to calm down and come up with him for that. Even without this fun new compulsion, he likes having Stiles with him. At the moment he'd just rather be with him in unconsciousness right now. 

Stiles narrows his eyes. "You do look like shit," he agrees. "Like twice-warmed shit actually, covered in flies."

Derek lifts a brow then shakes his head. "Gee, thanks."

"Is it-" Stiles stops and looks down then back up. "You know, because of the pregnancy?" He laughs as he says it but he doesn't break eye contact. Stiles will never be one to back down from something when it matters to him. It's one of his most infuriating and attractive personality traits.

"I don't know," Derek admits. His family never talked about it. There are books that survived the fire. There were talks with his parents but male wolves bearing cubs didn’t come up in the birds and the bees talk beyond the fact that if he did take a male mate, that was an option.

"Nowadays it takes work to generate a male heat. It's not something that can happen by accident like it can with a woman." His father had told him. "You don’t have to worry about that until you're older, and even then only if you decide you want to."

Then his mom and dad had teamed up on him and talked to him about specific types of contraceptives, basic sex how-to for men and women, and then about feelings in harrowing detail. His father told Derek how he should wait until he felt ready and his mother said how he should be careful with his heart, be sure. 

At the time had been thirteen and completely horrified. Remembering it, he's still horrified but more because if he had just listen then maybe – Well, there were a thousand maybes starting with Kate and spiraling out into the rest of his life. 

Right now, he mostly just wishes he'd talked to his dad about the specifics. There were so many answers he doesn’t have. His cub is the most important thing he's ever been ignorant about.

"You don't know? How can you not know? This isn’t a very special episode of I Didn't Know I Was Pregnant, Derek, what the hell even? You're a dude. I'm a dude. Dude plus dude does not equal Stiles Stilinski, father to be. The math just doesn’t work."

"Yeah, well, werewolf math can be different sometimes," Derek snaps.

"Yeah. Imaginary animals, imaginary numbers," he waves his hands through the air in frustration. "Whatever. I need some answers."

"I'm not Wikipedia. I don’t have all the answers. You're the research guy, not me."

Stiles rubs his hand over his head. "It doesn't – you're a man. I know you're a man. I've seen your cock, and your balls, and your utter lack of a vagina. How the hell can you be pregnant?"

"It's called heat for a reason."

"I thought that just meant it was just because you were so hot, in the sexy way." Stiles bites his lip and bobs his head and does a little shimmy thing with his shoulders. "You know like, hot and bothered."

Stiles blows his fucking mind, and at moments like this he can't tell if it's in a good or bad way. "Yeah? Where do you think that term comes from, idiot?"

Stiles stares at him, opened mouthed and wide eyed. He stares so long that Derek actually starts to fidget. Then he throws himself down on the couch next to Derek. "Damnit," He mumbles, dragging his hand over his face. "Damnit, damnit, damnit. My dad is going to kill me."

A bark of laughter is startled loose at that. "Your dad? That's what you're worried about?"

Stiles shifts so that he's folded up like a pretzel, sitting sideways on the couch facing Derek. "No. No, I'm freaking out about everything. Don't worry about me, I am super goddamn freaked. My level of panic is at about a thirty on a scale of one to ten with this latest supernatural clusterfuck."

Derek shrugs a shoulder and schools his expression. This is what he was expecting. He just didn’t think it would hurt this badly. "It's okay."

"How is this okay?"

"I just need to know if you'll show up if something comes up regarding the health of the cub before its born and needs your help." He drags a hand up his arm to his shoulder and back down. It doesn’t do enough to soothe his frazzled nerves. "You don't have to tell your dad. You don’t have to do anything else."

"I don’t have to do anything else," Stiles repeats. "I don’t have to do anything else at all?"

Derek shrugs. "No. We'll be fine."

"You'll be fine."

"I'm doing this on my own," he bites back. "We'll be fine without you."

"Without me," Stiles repeats, looking for all the world as if he'd just walked into the middle of a horror movie but who can blame Stiles for that? Derek is a monster after all.

"Yes. Is there an echo in here?" Derek mutters, hoping that he sounds more annoyed than wounded. 

Stiles is off the couch and on his feet. His heartbeat is hammering out a staccato beat so loud it echoes in Derek's head. He's panting like he's just run a five minute mile and the fury he can smell is suffocating. 

"Without me," Stiles spits. "Just you. And the baby, of course. My baby. Goddamnit, Derek, if I'm not totally hallucinating this whole thing then that-" he points an accusing finger at Derek's general abdomen area. "Is my baby too. Cub. Whatever."

His eyes aren't bright with just anger anymore. There are tears there too. Derek can smell the salt even though none have even reached his lashes.

"Stiles-" Derek tries but Stiles cuts him off.

"You don't get to keep me away. You can't do that, even if it's some crazy alpha wolf thing. I'll get Scott, we'll tell my dad about the werewolves and we'll– I don’t know. We'll do something." He's pacing again. Derek can't help but watch, fascinated, as Stiles’s various limbs and muscle groups give little twitches and jerks as he speaks as if to emphasize each separate indignation. "I haven’t figured out what that something is yet but I will because this isn't okay, all right? You can't do this to me or to our kid."

"Hey, I didn't-" he begins, trying again but no. Stiles is on a ramble, one with yelling and hand waving while the smells of hurt and fear and years-old grief pour out of him. Derek gives up because aside from throwing him across the room, there's no way to shut him up. 

"Because I know I'm not your favorite person. I get that. I'm fine with that but other night, when I came and got you at your house it was more than just your heat. You said, you put me first at station with Matt and then you show up in my bedroom to fucking cuddle." He rubs at his face with a fist like a child because the tears have pulled themselves loose are and rolling down his cheeks. "Derek, God, you can't do all of that and hate me."

The words feel like a blow to the gut. Annoy, infuriate, agitate and confuse, absolutely, but hate? Derek knows hate. He knows what it feels like and how it festers and he can't imagine hating Stiles. Even if he hadn't already burrowed too deep under Derek's skin to dig out, that could never happen. There's too much good in Stiles, so much Derek admires and wishes he had in himself, for hate to ever be a possibility. "I don't hate you."

"Okay, then why the hell are you talking about keeping my kid away from me when it barely even exists yet?" Stiles demands. "Because I promise, I promise I'll love it so fucking much I'll be awesome at parenting even if I'm really bad at it. I already do, you know, so if that's what you're worried about, you don’t have to. That kid will totally drown in the Stiles love."

"I never I said I hated you," Derek manages, feeling almost numb. He's so fucking tired and his head is starting to hurt. He can't tear his eyes away from Stiles or the desperate, hopeful look that's replaced his anger.

"Is it because I'm human? If that's why then you should, like, bite me now." Stiles thrusts out his arm. Derek finds himself nose to nose with skin so pale that he can see faint lines of blue veins just under the surface. "If you need do that, cool, whatever." 

He bats Stiles arm away. "I'm not biting you." Not like this anyway. 

"Then what?" Stiles demands. He drops his arms to the side then he takes a deep breath because apparently he forgot to do that in between all the frantic talking. "Because I know you grew up in this pack where you had all these people and you lost them."

Flinching is an involuntary response. Derek is better at keeping his features relaxed when people mention his family but not after all this, after everything Stiles has laid out for him like a gift. Especially not when Stiles drops down in front of him, planting both hands on his knees, the contact capturing his full attention because yes, the spark is still there. Even through his jeans, Derek can feel his skin starting to buzz under his touch.

"And I'm sorry. I don't get it exactly but you had them when you were little. There was just me and my dad for most of my life. And you know, my dad, he tried, he's awesome but I needed more than just my dad and my dad needed more than me too. So, you should let me be a dad with you, Derek. I can totally be that more if you just let me. Okay? Please."

The room goes silent and for a long time, Derek just waits. He's half expecting that Stiles is going to go off the next time he opens his mouth. When more than a minute ticks by without Stiles saying anything, Derek swallows whatever the hell it is he's feeling that's making the back of his throat ache and asks "You want to?"

"Oh my god, you are a fucking moron." Stiles groans, sitting back on his heels. "That's it? Seriously? You thought I wouldn't want to?"

Derek shrugs. "You're sixteen."

"Yes, which means I'm technically old enough to be on my own MTV show about this very thing. Minus the gay and werewolf elements."

That may be true but Derek remembers being sixteen. He had this whole future of possibilities stretching out before him before one stupid decision ruined everything. 

Derek knows that he will never forgive Kate or himself for that. He doesn't want to be something that Stiles can never forgive. "You've got your whole life ahead of you."

Stiles snorts and clambers to his feet. He wipes his face and laughs. "To do what? The rest of my life is currently going to include a freaking baby and a pack of werewolves. I don’t know how much more a liberal arts education could give me."

"You'll never know if you don’t get the chance."

Stiles shrugs. "I'll never know what life would be like if I never met you or if Scott never got bit. Both those things just happened but that doesn’t make them bad. This doesn't have to be bad if you let it be good."

"It's not bad," Derek blurts. It makes Stiles grin.

"I don’t think so. Complicated though, holy crap." He gives Derek a smile. "This should act as a warning. Never read werewolf porn then sleep with a werewolf. I should've known to take that whole 'breed me' thing you said during sex literally rather than finding it hot."

Derek just stares. "You are not normal." 

"That's part of my charm." Stiles says as he drops onto the couch.

He settles himself close to Derek, too close and not close enough at the same time. Derek can feel all his muscles tighten as Stiles presses his shoulder until his chest is wedged fully against Derek's side. 

He reaches out towards Derek, then freezes. Derek stares at Stiles’s hand hovering in a silent question. He nods and when Stiles hand settles on his stomach, everything unwinds. He even finds his head resting on a bony shoulder without his brain giving his neck permission to do so. He closes his eyes against the world and says "You can’t feel anything yet."

Stiles begins rubbing gentle circles through his shirt. "Shhh. I'm trying to commune with our puppy."

"Do not call it a puppy," Derek growls. "You get a puppy at the pound, put a leash on it and bend it to your will. My baby is not a puppy."

"Our baby." Stiles corrects. "This is so insane on all the levels starting with your manliness and going all the way down to the fact that you slept with me at all but dude. Baby." He turns his head and kisses the top of Derek's head, so quick that Derek doesn’t even have time to even consider pulling away. "This is the scariest thing to ever happen to me, including all the creepy monster shit in this town but I feel stupidly happy anyway. It's like emotional whiplash."

"Being around you is like being in a constant state of mental whiplash," he grumbles but doesn’t move away or lift his head. 

"But you're cuddling again anyway."

Derek sighs. "I am not– Look, it's a wolf thing."

"A wolf pregnancy thing." Derek doesn’t answer but Stiles doesn’t seem to need one. "Okay, I can work with that." 

He moves back tugging Derek with him and somehow he ends up with his head on Stile's lap. It feels like up in Stiles' room, safe in a way that makes him feel relaxed and strong all at once. Even the stress headache is starting to fade. 

Deaton is fucking right about him needing Stiles. Derek can physically feel the difference. Energy thrums through his body from everywhere Stiles is touching him. 

"Like this?" Stiles asks. His hand moves up to rake through Derek’s hair. Wolves don’t purr but he could. Except that Stiles did ask and no. Not exactly like this.

"No. Just-" He sits up and pushes Stiles down to sprawl on the couch, feeling mildly reassured by the fact that he is still capable of manhandling Stiles into things and places. Of course sliding up so that their bodies are pressed flush together ruins that but still. He's the one in control here. 

Then Stiles is touching him again. That hand is back on his stomach and the other is in his hair and fuck. Fuck this isn't normal. He isn't a needy person and he shouldn’t be feeling like this but that feeling is back, the one of quiet energy pouring into his body. It's sedating and since this is the first time Derek has actually felt safe since Laura left for Beacon Hills, he doesn’t fight the feeling. 

That’s probably why he didn’t hear any of the warning signs like a car pulling into the garage or footsteps in the hall. Instead he's jerked awake by Stiles father's voice. 

"What the hell is this?"

"Um," Stiles says, lamely as Derek yanks himself away so hard he falls off the couch. "Nothing?"

Derek clambers to his feet and stands at military attention. This man arrested him for his sister's murder. He's seen him at a violent, furious low and now sprawled all over his seriously underage son. He figures good posture and complete silence is the way right now.

"Try again," The Sheriff orders. "Try the truth."

"Well, you know, sometimes two dudes just need to cuddle. It's not totally unheard of."

"Stiles."

"Yeah. Okay. Um, Derek you know my dad? Dad, this is Derek Hale. You've met right?"

Derek nods and stands up straighter. "Sir."

"Hale."

"Well." Stiles pops to his feet. "Thank god that wasn’t awkward or anything."

"So you're seeing each other."

It's not a question. Before Derek can protest Stiles cuts in. "Dad, I actually want to talk to you about some things but right now isn't really-" 

"Right now sounds like the perfect time to discuss the murder suspect that was just on top of you," the Sheriff grits out. His tone is both terrifying and makes Derek miss his own dad at the same time. "However, I can tell already that this," he waves a hand between the two of them, "Is the least of it."

Stiles lets out a hysterical laugh. "Oh my god, you have no idea. How about you go get a beer in the kitchen and we'll be there in a second."

The Sheriff graces them both with matching skeptical looks. "And I should do that because?"

"Because of reasons. Dad, just this once let me confess at my own pace. Please."

The sheriff gives Derek a long glare that could peel paint off walls. "You have five minutes, then both of you need to be at the table, ready to talk to me."

Stiles nods and physically pushes his dad into the kitchen, closing the door behind him. He leans against it and drags a hand down his face. "I'm going to die. Actually literally die. Make sure you tell the puppy I love it, okay, because he's going to pull out his shotgun and mow me down."

"You're really putting me at ease." Derek says, crossing his arms over his chest. "And don't call it a puppy."

"Oh you don't need to worry. You're safe. You're carrying his grandchild in your superhealing magic body but I'm dead where I stand." He sighs. "Plus the werewolf thing isn't going to go over great either but I'm pretty sure the risky sex and unplanned parenthood is what's going to get me shot."

"You really think we need to tell him."

Stiles nods even though his eyes are huge with worry. "Yeah. I think we do. Mrs McCall knows. Actually, she's a nurse so that's probably really good for us right?"

Derek shrugs. He hadn't even thought of that. He'd gone to Deaton because who else was there to go to? It's just like Stiles to be two steps ahead of everyone else and it's just as disquieting as always.

"Whatever. The point is, I don't think hiding this from him is a good idea. Not for any of us, including the puppy."

"Stiles, it is not a puppy. It's a cub or a baby. Call it that again and-"

"What? You'll cause me bodily harm? I'm your baby daddy. You are not going to do that."

Oh he so will. He will throw Stiles across the room into one of the potted plants because puppy and baby daddy should never, ever refer to anything in his life. "Watch me."

"And if you do, my dad will hear it and get his gun, which is why I think this is something we have to do now. He's in charge of all the cops in Beacon Hills and he's my _dad_. It makes sense for him to know since your going to be around so much and then there'll a baby and-" Derek watches as Stiles rubs a hand over his fuzzy head. "If he's going to have a heart attack, I want him to hear everything at once so we only have to rush him to the ER once."

"Is that a joke?"

Stiles sags against the door. "Mostly. His heart isn't great but honestly, I just don’t want to lie to him anymore. Not about you, both of you. It's too important."

Goddamn him. God-fucking-damn him, Derek thought. He's been trying to keep this about the cub, about the mistake they made but then he's in Stile's bed or curled against him or the moron goes and says something like that and he can't exactly remember _why_ he was trying to keep this all in careful boxes.

All he manages to get out is a small "oh."

"Yeah. So. Brace yourself. It's time for your coming out ball."

"Really?" Derek snaps, annoyance helping put his feet back under him and steadying his world. Irritation with Stiles he knows how to work with. "A gay joke? Right now?"

Stiles rolls his eyes. "Please. That was a cotillion joke. Keep up, Growly McGee."

"Times up gentleman," Sheriff Stilinski calls. "That means right now, Stiles."

"I feel like I should be giving you a cigarette and a blindfold here," Stiles tells him in an apologetic tone. 

"I'll be fine."

"Will you though?" Stiles asks. "Because you have to go all furry faced in a minute and then there's the puppy so I feel like there's a legitimate reason to worry about you here."

Warmth suffuses Derek at that because Stiles is worried about him. He has someone on this planet again who cares about if he'll be alright. Of course what he says is, "I'm serious. My cub is not a fucking puppy."

"Our cub. You start calling it ours instead of yours and I'll think about not calling it the puppy anymore." 

Derek grits his teeth. He's just not sure if he's doing it in frustration or to keep himself from letting slip a small smile at Stiles' conviction to be involved. The dialectic is disconcerting. "Fine. Ours."

"Ours," Stiles says out a breath that sounds like it's been held for a while, then reaches behind him for the door. "Okay. Lets do this." Derek gives him a nod and follows him into the kitchen.

~*~*~

His dad offers Derek a beer when they get there as his own personal way of reminding Stiles that Derek is an adult. He is an over-21 adult who can have a beer if he wants. Only Derek says no thanks and Stiles brain nearly explodes because oh yeah. No alcohol. 

No alcohol because Derek? Derek is fucking pregnant. With a baby. His baby. Stiles can't actually figure out how this is happening and he's even more confused as to why he's so fucking happy because this is one hot mess but he is. He really fucking is. 

He pops out of the chair he just sank into because no beer but there are other things. He doesn’t know what Derek might need but he can get it, whatever it might happen to be. "We have non-alcoholic things. Zero proof and totally approved for things. Do you want water or orange juice or something? Because you should probably have something. Vitamin C is good for health things. I'll grab you some juice." 

"Stiles, sit down," his dad growls and Stiles does, throwing himself back into his chair so hard it nearly falls over.

"Mr. Stilinski-" Derek starts.

His dad doesn’t let him get any farther than that. "Sheriff Stilinski," he corrects and Stiles winces. That is not a good sign. "Now, one of you needs to start talking and if I don’t like what I hear, one of you is grounded for life and the other one is coming into the station to have a little talk about age of consent laws in the state of California."

Stiles winces. Yeah. He knows all about those. He researched them around the same time he discovered his dick. They don’t really work in Derek's favor, like, at all. 

So he blurts out the first thing he can think of. Unfortunately that just so happens to be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. "Derek's a werewolf and he's pregnant with my baby."

Derek drops his head onto the table with a hollow thunk. He groans and shakes his head on the wood. His father, on the other hand, is glaring at him – the sort that promises an imminent death of the slow and painful variety. 

"I'm not in the mood for games."

"That's good. I'm not playing. Derek, show him."

"Remember when I said I didn’t hate you?" he asks as he lifts his head from the table. "Now I do. Sheriff, I want to apologize in advance for this." He sighs and turns to look at Stiles' dad.

Before the Sheriff even has time to ask what that means, Derek growls lowly and his face changes. It will never not be weird, Stiles decides. Watching as teeth lengthen, ears grow to points, and eyes glow red is still bizarre and he's used to it. His dad looks ready to have that heart attack Stiles is always worrying about. 

"Dad."

"You're-"

"Dad, you need to take some deep breaths."

"Deep breaths probably aren't going to do it, Stiles," his dad chokes out. "Jesus. Jesus Christ. This isn't happening. I'm getting that beer and when I come back from the fridge, this little hallucination will have ended."

Stiles exchanges a look with Derek, the red fading from his eyes some and they both shrug. For a second, Stiles feels almost the same as he does when he's with Scott. Like understanding is just there and always was, waiting right under the surface. It's weirdly easy.

"Jesus Christ," his dad says again when turns back around, beer bottle gripped in his fist. "How is this even-" He breaks off to take a long drink, swallows and says again. "Jesus Christ."

Stiles looks from his dad's pale face to Derek who shrugs again. "He's not really involved in this? Religious iconography doesn’t really have that much impact on werewolves, does it?”

"Not really," Derek mumbles.

"Right. See? Not really because that's a vampire thing and vampires aren’t real but werewolves are. Scott's one too. So's Jackson Whittmore and like, a few other people but that doesn’t really matter because that vein in your head is really throbbing."

Stiles could actually see the thing pulsing right above his right eye. It's gross and upsetting. "So, there is a werewolf in my kitchen." His father says each syllable as if they cut his mouth on the way out. 

"He can hear you, dad. Derek is right here. Don't be rude."

Derek rubs his wolfy forehead. "It's fine,” he says, resignation clear in his voice.

"It's not because you're family now and he has to treat you better."

"Family?" Derek chokes out. He looks like Stiles just hit him in the face with a wet fish. He doesn't really get that though. He thought the whole having-a-baby-together thing made family ties obvious. 

"Family?" his dad repeats. He rubs the vein in his head with the rim of his beer bottle. "Stiles, you're hard to follow on a good day but right now? I can't even begin to understand this. There are _werewolves_."

"Yes" Stiles agrees, hoping this part will be over soon. "Mrs. McCall knows. If you want, you can talk to her about it some? She's sort of had a crash course in dealing with supernatural craziness."

"Melissa knows. Of course she does. It's Scott." His father shakes his head in dismay. "Scott is a werewolf. There is a werewolf at my kitchen table."

"Yeah," Stiles agrees. He wants to get past the explaining and on to yelling and punishing stage. That’s always the next step in his and his dad's relationship. First is the explanation, then punishment, then the inevitable forgiveness and reconciliation. "There are werewolves."

"Pretty sure he can see that," Derek mutters.

Stiles valiantly resists the urge to kick him under the table because number one, Derek is technically his baby mama and number two, this whole experience is painful enough without him adding to it. 

"So, as you can see, Derek is a werewolf and we accidentally had unsafe sex while he was in heat. We didn't mean to. But now, there's a, um, a magical male pregnancy. Oops? Anyway, it's kind of complicated but long story short, I'm sorry I'm going to be a teen dad, please don’t disown me. " 

Stiles closes his eyes as against the words even as he says them. Some part of him still ascribes to the little kid belief that if you can't see someone, they can't see you. Plus, it helps him brace if his dad decides to throw something. He's never done it before of course but he's never been told that a male werewolf is carrying his grandchild either. It's good to be prepared.

Only nothing happens. Stiles opens one eye, just a bit, to find his dad hasn't moved. He's still sitting with his hand gripping the beer, his eyes wide. 

"Dad?"

"Quiet." His dad orders without moving his mouth. "Just be quiet for a minute."

Stiles mouth snaps shut. His father drinks the entire beer in silence. When he's done, he waves the bottle at Derek. "And you're a werewolf."

"Yes, sir."

" You're pregnant despite being a man."

"Yes sir," Derek repeats. He's actually blushing. It is the weirdest thing. Stiles didn’t think Derek was capable of blushing at all, let alone doing it in his wolf form.

"From my sixteen year old son. My underage son on whom, according the state of California, you committed statutory rape."

Derek shifts back to human and looks stricken, like he's just been shown footage of one of those horrible atrocities that end in mass graves or people on fire. His quiet "Yes sir," sounds as if it's been torn from his throat with sharp claws. 

"Dad, it's not like that. He didn't do anything-"

"Stiles," his dad snaps, "was I talking to you?"

"No."

He gives Stiles a look that clearly articulates _then maybe you shouldn't talk for once._ What he actually says doesn’t touch on Stiles' behavior at all. 

"Look," his dad says with the kind of careful calm that is a lid forced over a storm of anger. "Given what I've just seen and given the fact neither of you gain anything but a world of trouble by telling me this – I believe you. We are going to deal with this, we'll have to, and you both are going to man up and take responsibility for the colossal disaster you've created." 

Stiles nods and somehow manages to keep his mouth shut. He hasn’t seen his dad this upset since his mom died, not even when Stiles almost cost him his job. Guilt washes Stiles like a wave and he wishes that he could do something to comfort himself and Derek, who still looks gutted, something stupid like reach out and take Derek's hand. Then he decides, fuck it, and does it anyway, lacing his fingers with Derek's under the table.

Derek turns and stares at him, his ridiculous eyebrows shooting up towards his hairline. Stiles gives his hand a squeeze and his eyes widen further before he nods. Stiles means it. When Derek squeezes back, Stiles feels relief wash over him. 

They're in this together and they've gotten through worse that way. Compared to almost having to cut off Derek's arm, holding him up in water for two hours, and surviving Peter, Matt's psychotic break, the kanima and Gerard Argent – getting through a supernatural pregnancy should be a piece of cake. 

Granted, it will be a really large, difficult to cut cake with tiers and a center that could explode at any time if not approached properly. Still. Cake. 

"We're going to deal with this," his dad promises. "But right now, Derek is going to go get his things and I'm going to drive him home. When I get back," he turns his full focus on Stiles now, "you and I are going to have a long talk about secrets and lying and how draconian your punishment is going to be."

"That's fair," Stiles concedes as Derek untangles their hands. 

"I left my shoes upstairs." Derek says and disappears. Clearly he's not bothering to hold back on his wolf speed now that everything is all out in the open. 

This leaves Stiles alone at the kitchen table with his dad. Stiles can feel his glare all the way to his bones and wants to sink through the floor to the center of the earth.

"What were you thinking?" he asks finally. "Werewolves? Magic? That’s not even touching on the fact that you're sleeping with men without protection." He rubs his face. "I keep trying to figure out what your mother would say."

Fuck. His dad only brings up his mom when things are particularly desperate or he is drunk. It makes Stiles ache with missing her, with hating himself for driving his dad to this point. "I'm sorry."

"Yeah. I bet you are," he agrees. The he reaches across the space between them and places a hand on Stiles. "Stiles, when I stop being so mad I could strangle you, we're going to work this out. It's going to be okay."

He covers his dad’s hand with his own. He doesn’t really buy that yet. It's hard to imagine things will be alright when there's so much shit hitting such a big fan but his dad is going to back him up. So Stiles thinks that yeah, maybe it will be. 

"Thanks, Dad."

"You're welcome. And grounded."

Stiles sighs and almost smiles at the normality of it. "Yeah. I figured."

His dad pats his shoulder and then rises to his feet. He calls Derek's name. Stiles sits still and listens until the door closes behind them and he can hear the cruiser pull out of the driveway.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] There Will Be An Essay Portion](https://archiveofourown.org/works/511666) by [dodificus](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dodificus/pseuds/dodificus)




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